| 11.21.2009 |
Awesome. I'm back. Over two
years since the last update. Well, the family corner gets regular photo
updates, but Chrutil's been busy.
So, what's new? Maya turned four years old and Hanna just turned two. That's
crazy. Crazy cute too. Both of them.
I'm back working on AutoCAD these days, specifically on a piece of
technology that will be revealed when we ship the next version. Needless to
say, I'm having a blast.
Coolness: Yes it finally happened. Almost ten years in the
making, but today I am proud to announce that Chrutil finished his
Arcade Machine. |
| 11.12.2007 |
A Day of Celebration
- We are tremendously proud to announce the birth of Hanna Camille Janson
Today Marie gave birth to Hanna, our second little baby girl. Everything went well,
and Hanna came out perfectly at 7 lbs 3 oz (3260g) and 20" tall (51cm) - To obtain
visual proof that Hanna is indeed the cutest baby in modern times (at least
since the invention of the camera), please see the photo album we
setup in the new Family Area |
| 10.7.2007 |
Sorry for the lack of updates
this summer. If you have a website you know how it is. All work and no play
makes Jack a dull boy. So what's new... Well I got myself an iPhone. I
couldn't resist. The verdict is mixed. Definitely the coolest portable
internet/photo/iPod device ever. As for the phone, I'm a little less
psyched, but it's alright - My trusty old Ericsson P910 was definitely a
better phone, and I could write programs for it too.
Bluetooth support has been working mostly okay - it connects to both our
hands free systems in the Dodge and in the Toyota so that's good. I have has
a few dropouts, when I receive a call on UConnect, and when answering
suddenly the car can't find the phone so I have to dig up the handset.
Hopefully these things will sort themselves out as they continue tuning the
firmware. Which brings me to the recent 1.1.1 update that has been bricking
modded iPhones across the country. Chrutil has only one thing to say about
that: Fuck Apple. There, I said it. Mine is blissfully unhacked, but it just
shows how much Apple actually cares about their customer base.
This is my first apple device ever as far as I can recall, except an iPod
nano I bought for my wife. So not being a regular apple customer also makes
me wonder what the hell I'm going to do with $100 apple store credit that I
got from being an 'early sucker' getting an iPhone. I'm, like, 40. I have
bought two apple things in my life - that's one every 20 years. I hate
iTunes, I don't buy music in volatile forms, and... well I don't know what
else, but hopefully they'll start selling some better iPhone headphones in
the apple store - then I could get me a better sounding pair.
So, in effect, I love my new internet device, but knowing a little bit more
about how Apple treats their customers now I probably wouldn't buy another
one.
Anyway, what else is going on - Maya turned two a few weeks ago. She's
totally the cutest ever - check out the
recent picture collection from the summer vacation in Sweden.
Work is interesting, and by that I mean interesting as in the old Chinese
proverb/curse "May you live in Interesting Times". But I'm not complaining -
we're doing cool stuff on the frontline here, and we're getting some good
buzz.
These days I'm working on an application called Autodesk Impression.
Check it out.
As you can see from the previous entry I did eventually get myself a Wii.
Very neat machine. Mats and I are headlong into Zelda, and I've got Paper
Mario, Metroid, Resident Evil and a few others to play with.
I also have Forza 2 on the XBox 360, and, of course, Halo 3, which I got on
launch day but haven't opened yet. I did get a force feedback steering wheel
for Forza 2, and that's just plain cool.
Oh, I almost forgot - I got a new MediaCenter computer - I moved my Panny
plasma TV out of the living room into the TV room, and that meant that the
mediacenter computer couldn't be in the basement anymore. This turned into a
big deal since the old machine was pretty noisy. To fix this I ended up
buying a new computer - buying as in retail - This is probably the first
computer I bought retail since my Amiga 1000 some 22 years ago. I found that
HP had $400 off any computer over $999m so I managed to get a nifty
quad-core system fully specced out with a 512MB DirectX 10 graphics card and
2 gig RAM, blabla for something $1000. This machine is great! Silent, but
deadly as they say.
That's it for now - time to go winter prep the garden. My iPhone claims
is it'll rain on Tuesday. |
| 1.27.2007 |
Wii got one! |
| 12.18.2006 |
Practically Christmas. This
should be a happy time, but when there are two new consoles that I don't
have out there there are reasons to complain.
I am, of course, talking about the Nintendo Wii and the Sony PS3. The Wii
looks fabulous, but after having been to ToysRUs three times a week for the
last month I am disillusioned. Maybe I'll get one. Maybe I won't.
The Sony launch titles for the PS3 - What are they thinking? Contrary to my
traditional thinking I have decided to only get a PS3 when there is a game
I'd like to play on it.
For now I'm looking forward to Forza Motorsport II on the XBox 360 - that
should be sweet!Maya is walking around like she owns the house, and she's
getting cuter by the day so all is good.
|
| 10.16.2006 |
So, after ten years of working on
it I finally, today, finished reading The Dark Tower.
It feels pretty sad to have finished it I have to say... Oh well.I guess
it is worth celebrating though so to commemorate the finishing of this,
Stephen Kings Magnum Epos, I decided to buy a bike.
The Bianchi 928. |
| 10.11.2006 |
This is the rock-on month
of the century - Three days ago I was lucky enough to see Kamelot live for
the first time. They were awesome! Today, in just a few hours, I will be
seeing Queensryche perform Operation: Mindcrime I and II live at Warfield
here in San Francisco. There is few words that can describe how cool this
is. But I will nevertheless try - I'd have to go with something like:
Dude. Dude!! Dude!!!
Yeah. It's that cool. Be there or be [a rectangular thing] |
| 10.5.2006 |
Sold! I'm like a no corvette kind
of guy. Today I sold my beloved Stingray.
For the first time since January 2002 I no longer have any Corvettes.
It sure feels lonely, but for a station wagon my
new Magnum is as cool as they get. |
| 9.29.2006 |
It is now almost exactly one year
ago that I sold my beloved Corvette C5. To celebrate the anniversary of the
sale, I have decided to put up my other
beloved Corvette, the 1971 Stingray, for sale as well.
Selling both my Corvettes is not something I do lightly though. I have come
to the realization that a new house and a baby is enough to deal with - I
just don't have time to drive or improve the Stingray anymore so there we go
- it's probably better to let someone else that can enjoy it more than I can
right now take over.So, no Corvette anymore - now what?
Tell you what., I got myself a station wagon!
Although it's more like a "cartoon station wagon" - it's a
light silver 2006 Dodge Magnum SRT-8.
This machine is powered by a super powerful 6.1 Liter HEMI V8 with 425
horsepowers stock!! And this one has an aftermarket mopar cold
air intake to boost it a little more (as if that's really needed). 20"
wheels 255 rear and 245 front. All in all the sweetest thing I have ever
had. The power is simply fantastic! |
| 9.15.2006 |
Happy Birthday Maya!
Maya turns one year old today. |
| 8.22.2006 |
So many new things that I'm not
sure where to start.
I guess we can start with the essentials. Chrutil.com is now officially
joining the club of Web 2.0. Technically the only difference is the
new softed mirrored web 2.0 logo with the mandatory beta disclaimer at the
top of the page, but that seems to work for everybody else so what the
hell...
What else, oh yes - I picked up a new TV. Since the 50" plasma was in
the main living room and the projector is in the family room, I have been
using my 24" lcd computer monitor as the TV since we moved in to the new
house. Well yesterday I picked up a Philips 37" LCD HDTV, which I
guess bumps the count to three HDTV's in the house... It's true what they
say - (or at least what I say) You can never have too many, or too big TVs.
Maya is growing like a mushroom and she is getting cuter by the week.
She's 11 months old now and crawling around and pulling herself up to
standing wherever she is not allowed to.
This year marked the first year since 1996 when I have not gone to Siggraph.
I decided to spend the week on vacation here at home with Maya and Marie
instead. Much better, and I can probably order of the proceedings anyway.
Speaking of vacation, I guess it's time to spill the beans on another new
project - Ever since I was a little boy I always wanted my very own arcade
game. So, yes, now the time has come. I am building a Mame Arcade cabinet.
This project will probably take forever and can justify its own page, but
for now, I can say that I put together a machine based around a Pentium 4
2.4 GHz with 512 MB RAM and an old Asus P4R800 motherboard that I had lying
around. I spent countless hours in from of AutoCAD 2007 to design the
cabinet. The next step is to go buy the wood and start cutting. I have all
the buttons and joysticks already, but a 3" translucent blue Happ Trackball
needs to be ordered as well. Cool... Now I can relive all those countless
hours in front of Rally X... |
| 4.24.2006 |
Another one!!
What is Chrutil talking about now, you may ask? Another Baby? Another
Corvette?? A new House?!?
No, I got another Sunfire True Signature EQ subwoofer.
This may seem extreme to some, but the problem is that with the new house I
had to split up some of my equipment. In the main TV/Theater room I
inherited B&W speakers built into the ceiling for the rear surrounds, and
that allowed me to put the two remaining Canton CD-360F
speakers in the Dining Room. This dining room is also where we decided to
put the Panasonic 50" Plasma TV, and If you have a nice Plasma TV and a set
of yummy Canton speakers, you also need - yes exactly - A Sunfire True
Signature EQ subwoofer with a built-in 2700 watt amp. Said and done.
This new system is currently driven in stereo using my lovely
champagne/rosewood Sony TAE-80ES pre-amplifier and a Denon
POA-2200 stereo power amp. This is also where the primary media
center computer is connected.
Some sad news. As I mentioned before, I did finally find an
xbox 360. Well, it turned out that the network connector on this
machine was pretty flaky - it flipped on and off the new all the time
so I had to return the damn thing. Naturally they are all sold out
everywhere again so I'm fresh out of xbox as it is.
Some better news - I heard yesterday that at the Queensryche concert
I will go to this October, they will play Operation Mindcrime I and II from
start to finish with a fully theatric setting. Holy Shit. This is... like...
Yeah!!! |
| 4.4.2006 |
It's my birthday!
To celebrate me, Queensryche today released the follow-up to their 1988
masterpiece Operation Mindcrime -
Operation Mindcrime II is finally
out!!
So far I've got mixed feelings about it, but I have only let it spin a few
times so far so it's hard to say. Some tracks are quite promising and I have
yet to study the lyrics. Chances are that I won't fully get into the album
until I see it performed live in october.
The house is coming together nicely, but we're still not fully moved in -
the plasma TV is still not up on the wall yet for example...
The layout of the TV room is somewhat interesting so it doesn't lend itself
to a plasma TV - I temporarily put my 24" widescreen DELL lcd monitor as my
TV display (just in front of the projection screen). This means that the
plasma will go up in the living room, it'll probably be good.
LEGO. Yes Lego. Guess what I just preordered? The
Lego Mindstorms NXT robotic
system! Yes. Lego started taking preorders and I'm in line.
This things looks as sweet today as the original Mindstorms did when I got
my 1.0 brick. |
| 4.1.2006 |
Finally!! I found a damn
XBOX 360.
I had almost given up but finally it's here next to me. Looks pretty good,
although I'm pretty sad that the media center extender doesn't play DVD's
remotely. I have my DVD's ripped to a central server (using dvd shrink) and
I was intending to use the 360 (or perhaps even a couple of them) to
distribute audio/video throughout the house. Well I could do that with music
and TV, but not with movies which sort of... suck.
I guess I could always try ripping them to windows media... |
| 3.9.2006 |
Too many home theaters game make
you realize you need more of another thing.
A new house, for example. Said & done - we bought a new house. After
spending lots of time & effort on our remodeling plans for the lovely Sunny
Drive house, we decided to see what else is out there - and we found this
beautiful house in San Rafael - Two days layer we put in our offer and now,
a month later we have moved in and are unpacking a never ending stash of
stuff.
On Saturday Dream Theater is coming to play, and it'll be sweet.
Still no xbox 360 - but I did find one in stock at our local Target
store. I didn't buy it because it was the Core system and I'm Chrutil.
Chrutils want Premium - so Chrutil has to wait. Piss poor launch of a game
system if you ask me - It's been out of what - six months now? and it's
still impossible to find. If it wasn't for the media center extender built
in to it (which is something I need) I would simply pre-order
a PS3 instead. At this time I don't care anymore. |
| 2.6.2006 |
Lots of things going on. So many
I can't really talk about it all, but stay tuned for some new stuff. |
| 12.16.2005 |
So it's like mid December. Time
flies indeed. Our three month old daughter Maya is fantastic, and we're all
happy.
The old home theater gear is almost all gone - I finally found a new home
for my beloved Infinity Kappa 8 including the Avalanche amps, and the Kappa
8.1's, the kappa center, the Adcom amp and a spare Infinity Polygraph
element are all gone too. It's getting empty here at home...
The upstairs media system (our living room system) is now in a pretty good
state. The main parts are a Panasonic 50" plasma, a Sunfire Theater Grand II
pre-amp/processor, a Sunfire Cinema Grand power amplifier, five Canton 360F
speakers, a Sunfire True Signature EQ subwoofer , a Harmony remote, a
Microsoft Media Center computer, a Panasonic DVD-H1000 DVD player, and a
Motorola HD cable box.The downstairs theater is what I'm looking at next
- It's the Sony 10HT Projector and the 106" 16x9 DaLite Cosmopolitan
Electrol screen fed by a toy Sony home-theater-in-a-box thing. I also have
the Sony 32" widescreen CRT, and the game systems (xbox, ps2, gamecube, n64)
are all on this system too. I need a good-bang-for-the-buck receiver and 5
speakers+sub system that at least gives me a decent experience. I also need
a good dvd player down here, but I'm thinking I might as well see how the
xbox 360 is (once I can get hold of one) before I buy something. |
| 10.31.2005 |
Happy Halloween ladies! (Yes
that's Kurgan for you who that that sounded familiar)
To celebrate Halloween I have decided to let Marie convince me that remote
controls need hard buttons.
Thus my beloved ProntoPro has to go - it is on eBay
for the ones interested.
I believe a Logitech Harmony 880 is coming to a Home Theater near me real
soon. |
| 10.1.2005 |
It's October. And to celebrate
that we have reorganized the website quite a bit. A whole new
family area is emerging on Chrutil's Domain. |
| 9.15.2005 |
A Day of Celebration
- We are tremendously proud to announce the birth of Maya Pauline
Janson
Today Marie gave birth to Maya, our little baby girl. Everything went well,
and Maya came out perfectly at 7 lbs (3150g) and 20" tall (51cm) - To obtain
visual proof that Maya is indeed the cutest baby in modern times (at least
since the invention of the camera), please see the photo album we
setup in the new Family Area |
| 9.2.2005 |
So I sold my lovely C5 Corvette.
First time in a while with only one Corvette...
It feels a little strange, and I'm sure I'll miss it.No sad faces though,
I just realized I missed the music event of the decade - Planet P Project,
Tony Carey's cool side project, has blessed us with a new album - the first
album in 20 years! And the album is fantastic!! Even better, it's the first
part of a trilogy of albums called 1931 : Go Out Dancing, and as that wasn't
cool enough, he says in some interview I read that things are happening in
the Zone so we might get to revisit the Pink World universe some time as
well! Those who knows anything about anythying knows that Pink World is one
of the most influential albums out there and I can't wait to hear what's
going on behind the barrier. Artemis? Come back! |
| 8.14.2005 |
It took me a while to realize but
eventually it came to me : I needed a full PDA style phone. I want my
internet right there beside me. The device of choice ended up being a
Sony-Ericsson P910a. Two words: Bloody Fantastic! The next thing is
that I have been suffering from a disease lately. It took me a while to
recognize, but once diagnosed it was easily taken care of. The problem was a
severe case of megapixelitis. I simply needed a new camera. I don't need
another point-and-shoot style camera though, my canon S-400 is great! No,
this was worse, I missed my SLR camera, nice lenses and all that. You know..
heavy stuff. But film... no can do.
In came a beautiful Canon 20D, 8.2 megapixel camera. Fantastic
piece. 5 shots / sec for 23 frames at full res. This is all I ever wanted in
a camera. Except perhaps more lenses... Click click click click.
Oh, and if you want to buy a lovely Corvette
1998 Coupe - Ping me - I can't get away with having two Corvettes now
that we have a baby coming.
No need to ping me for the vette - it's sold. |
| 7.1.2005 |
I'm alive! I'm alive!! But
unlike Elivis, FrankenHooker, and all the other freaks claiming to be alive,
I actually am.
The best way to make sure you are alive is to take a swim. But don't go
nude, go with your spanking new cool Motorola V3 Razr cell phone.
It that by itself doesn't make you feel alive, then your wife surely will,
once you tell her you broke your new cell phone and you just have to
spend $400 on a new even cooler one.
I didn't even have time to tell you how cool the Razr was before I have to
get a new one, but the new one is a Sony-Ericsson k750i - Back to Ericsson
for me. Swedish quality. Ha!
|
| 3.30.2005 |
This is first for Chrutil, but I
have decided I am selling parts of the Home Theater setup. Among the things for sale I
have the legendary Infinity Kappa 8 speakers, Infinity
Kappa 8.1 speakers, Infinity Kappa Center
speaker, Sony SVR-2000 TiVo, Avalanche A-10 mono
blocks, Adcom GFA-6000 5-channel power amplifier, etc,
etc.
If you are interested - check it out - new
pictures online!! |
| 3.24.2005 |
It's small. It's black.
It's shiny. It's... C O O O O L ! ! !
It's a PSPYes indeed it is. This new
handheld little game console, media player, whatever thingy, from Sony, is
incredibly impressive. I didn't want to pre-order it because I didn't feel
like paying for a bunch of accessories that I didn't want or need so I woke
up unseasonably early (Marie is out on a business trip) and headed up to our
nearest Target store at 8am and guess what - I was able to get my hands on
one!!
I got Wipeout for it since I didn't really feel for any of the games - but
you can always play Wipeout.
Compared to the this the Nintendo DS is a toy - arguably it's also more
expensive so it's not really comparable. Anyway, why choose when you can
have both? Muahahaa. |
| 2.20.2005 |
15 years late, but much like
cheese and fine wine only better with time:
Last week we went to see Queensrÿche performing their masterpiece
Operation: Mindcrime
from start to finish including stage show, actors. videos and all.
Magnificent!New toy : A Nintendo DS found its way into my
life. So far it has been a pleasant experience, but I have yet to find the
killer game for it. In the meantime I'm cruising through Super Mario 64. |
| 2.19.2005 |
The Home Theater
has received an upgrade.
I replaced the Infinity Kappa 8's and instead I got 5 wall mounted Canton
CD-360F speakers together with a Sunfire True Signature EQ subwoofer. I also
decided to update the power amp and finally got a Sunfire Cinema
Grand 5 channel power amp. |
| 2.8.2005 |
Finally!!
As many of you know Marie and Christer got married in October 2004.
We finally started to put together the photos and the first iteration is now
online.
Check it out! |
| 6.27.2004 |
This year has seen a new theme
emerge. The theme is that Highlander was wrong - There can be more than one.
It started with the HomeTheater - when I got myself a Panasonic TH-50PHD6UY
50" flat panel plasma HDTV and a MediaCenter PC. This caused the Sony
Projector and the Panasonic DVD player to relocate to the basement - The
result is that I now have two HomeTheaters at home - or, in fact, a
Home MultiPlex.And then, the other, more recent toy - a car.
Another car. Not just any car, but another Corvette!
This time it's not a spanking new C5 - since I already have one of those -
no, we're talking about the original batmobile, a 1971 Stingray.
Check it out . |
| 5.11.2004 |
Is Chrutil still alive??
Indeed he is. We're keeping busy beyond description - in March/April we went
for a 7 week world tour that included shopping in Bangkok, Trekking in
Nepal, Driving in France and, of course, Pizza in Sweden.
The house is lovely, lots of new toys has arrived - most notably a 50" HD
Plasma display and a
MediaCenter driven HomeTheaterPC. Pictures and Info is
coming real soon now.
I'm slowly but surely developing my skill set mowing the lawn, and poking at
strange unfamiliar things in the garden.
I went to see Kraftwerk live at Warfield the other day - very cool as
expected, although I recall it being even better last time I saw them. |
| 12.2.2003 |
Where do I start? So much has
been happening lately. Biggest news first, I guess. We've bought a
house!! My better half Marie and I have found a lovely house in a
cute little town called San Anselmo - 20 minutes or so away from Golden Gate
- so we're still in beautiful Marin county. We will post much more about the
house as soon as the deal is closed. Another cool thing going on is what I
call "The Bowman Project". It's sucking
up some of my energy - whatever is left from the house stuff and the regular
job. |
|
9.29.2003 |
Today would have been my grandmothers
100 year birthday, would she still be with us.
Happy Birthday Mormor! We miss you! |
|
9.29.2003 |
Wonderful. The freshly installed
Frontpage on my spankin' brand new machine crashes when I try to load this
site. |
| 5.25.2003 |
It's been a long time updating
this site, and I've got tons of new stuff going on, but hopefully there will
be frequent updates for a little while, while I get back to sync.
Some new toys has arrived, most notably a new beautiful
Canon PowerShot S400 digital camera.
This little piece of magic has 4 megapixels, is small and light and all in
all is very cool.
A couple of new skate configurations. Some
new wheels and a new deck - the gorgeously sweet Deathbox Brad Bowman - a
limited edition (one out of 100) with the new wide shape and the old
graphics. |
| 3.12.2003 |
It's mid-march and life is good.
I nearly lost the whole site due to a mishap with a harddrive backup (I
physically misplaced the drive, but found it lying around in a bookshelf).
Spring is around the corner, and a long weekend of snowboarding is coming up
in a week or two. |
| 2.10.2003 |
There's been some new
skateboard related updates, including a
couple of new arrivals. |
| 2.1.2003 |
A sad day indeed. Orbiter
Columbia disintegrates on reentry. |
| 1.13.2003 |
Well, the Christmas stuff
(including those blue lights) are gone. Proudly, I might add, on the day
they are supposed to be taken down - 20 days after Christmas Eve.
New Year - New challenges - To Infinity and Beyond! |
| 1.5.2003 |
2003! Can you believe it!! We're...
like... living in the future!!
Christmas came and went, so did New Years. The only evidence something's up
are my 900 blue holiday lights on my balcony, the 20" Santa-Claus candle at
prime location in my living room and all the other dozens or so ridiculous
Christmas things I found in a box in my storage. Another week to go before I
can take them down...
Hope you all had some good time off - I had two full weeks off and I didn't
even read email... Not that I could, since the storm took out my internet
connection last week and AT&T aren't coming to fix it until Tuesday.. |
| 12.4.2002 |
New theme, and a firm indication
that if
there was a Golden Turkey award for crappy websites, I would score! |
| 11.30.2002 |
This may sound ridiculous, but I
have decided to pick up skateboarding again.
During the 70's and 80's my trusty board never left my side, but I don't
think I used it during the 90's at all. Recently I realized I missed it so -
why the hell not? Got a new board and a few more decks incoming... |
| 11.22.2002 |
Oh great. They canceled
"Birds of Prey" - one of the few good new TV shows out there - after
only 13
episodes. @#$%^& |
| 11.17.2002 |
Just came back from a week in
Cozumel, Mexico. Snorkeling, wedding (no, not mine) and all kind of odd
activities. Great place, although I was lucky traveling there with a dozen
or so friends - otherwise the possible activities on this island might not
have been able to sustain my interest for a full week. As it was I had a
great vacation where I didn't really think about work at all for a full
week. I'm not sure that's ever happened before.
I got to use my new snorkeling gear - a pair of beautifully black & blue
Atomic 'Splitfin' fins - speedy little buggers, it felt like I was doing
five knots out there. |
| 10.29.2002 |
Last Friday I saw something I
always wanted to see, but never thought I would: I saw DEVO
playing live. They were having a free concert right here at civic center in
central San Francisco presented by Nissan that had a road show for their new
350z (which is actually a nice little thing!). They went on
for an hour and played most of their classic stuff: Whip It, Satisfaction,
Mongoloid, etc. I was a big fan of the New Traditionalists album when it
came out back in '81, and I didn't think they played enough of that - other
than that I was in heaven. Yeah, they even had their red hats
from "Freedom of Choice" on. |
| 10.21.2002 |
Okay, I've got to admit - I'm in geek heaven.
I recently dug out my old HP calculators for no particular reason. I've got
my old HP-71b and my 'new' (meaning it's only 10 years old)
HP-48sx and I started playing around with them and I realized I
missed my trusty old HP-41c that I traded in for the HP-71B back in 1985... Well, no
matter, I can't go around missing things like that so I today actually went ahead
and bought a HP-41cv and while I really haven't got a clue
what I'll use it for, this is one of those things that is just pleasant
to own. I don't know, perhaps it takes a true geek to understand this
one. Whatever keeps me happy - eh? |
| 10.20.2002 |
After this I'll stand up for a
week. I spent the weekend sitting down - I attended an event called Three Nights of Extreme Cinema.
Dark Wave
- A very cool event featuring eight 'dark' films. Anyway, I went in to the
theater at 2pm on Saturday and came out at 1:30am. Eleven-and-a-half hours
in a move theater is as far as I remember my personal record. like I said -
After this I'll stand up for a week. The films? Sweet and awful, but all in
all very cool. I've seen some weird shit in my days, but "TEENAGE
HOOKER BECAME KILLING MACHINE IN DAEHAKROH" is definitely up there
among the most bizarre. How about this synopsis: "When
a teacher discovers one of his teenaged students is a streetwalker, he
blackmails her into becoming his sex slave. When she becomes pregnant, he
hires hit men to off her, then slice and dice the corpse. A twisted Dr.
Frankenstein fashions what's left into an unstoppable cyborg and soon
RoboHooker is hot on the trail of her killer.". Yeah, told you so.
This one puts even FrankenHooker to shame - and that's not a small feat. |
| 10.15.2002 |
Yeah!! Went to another book
signing - Clive Barker signing his latest book Abarat. This is
a children's book (10+ years) and perhaps a departure from his previous
stuff, but so far I'm half way through it and I love every word of it! |
| 10.9.2002 |
So what's new? Well, I went to
see Rush in concert - sweet, awesome, and kick-ass cool!
The daily feel is centered around time, and specifically that there is not
enough of it. This was started by the fact that once you get a TiVo you
realize how much must-see-TV you're actually missing. I mean my TiVo
records about five or six hours of stuff every day. And unless I sit there
and watch the damn thing for all that time I feel like I'm missing out on
something. Not sure what my point is, but I guess one way to look at it is
that it strengthens your mind because you're staying away from something you
really want to do, I mean I'm not going to spend 6 hours watching TV every
night - I've got stuff to do.. Nevertheless, Enterprise, Smallville
and Dead Zone are the only shows I can't miss - other than that I'm catching
lost episodes of Deep Space 9, Voyager, Stargate SG-1, Louis & Clark, South
Park, Jay and Conan's monologues, and perhaps even some Buffy :-). Simpsons
and Star Trek: The Next Generation are not included for the very good reason
that I'm building up the DVD collection - Two seasons of Simpsons and four
of Next generation are currently available, and I'm eagerly waiting for
more.Slowly cruising along with Mario Sunshine with 30 shine sprites.
It'll last a while, not because it's difficult, but Mats and I aren't
playing it that often. |
| 9.17.2002 |
All is well. The TiVo is quiet
with 127 hours recording, Rush is playing on Shoreline Amphitheater on
Friday and both Spock's Beard and Enchant has new albums out. |
| 9.9.2002 |
No rest for the wicked. The TiVo
is now hacked into a 104 hour unit. Who-hooo!! The harddrive I used is a
little noisy so I put in an order for an 80 gigs Seagate Barracuda IV with
what they call "SoftSonic fluid-dynamic-bearings" and other wow and flutter
supposedly making the drive really quiet. It'll be a 120 hour unit when the
new drive comes in. |
| 9.4.2002 |
Long time no update. For some
good reasons I might add. I've been changing computers and operating systems
around here and I just restored the backups to start fiddling with the site
again. I've also been busy building models - been building a Klingon Bird of
Prey and also finishing up a USS Enterprise 1701-D with fiber optic lights
that I started building in 1996...
A New Toy has arrived - I finally decided I'll probably never get
around to building one myself, so I went out and got myself a TiVo - The
Sony SVR-2000 (the nice looking one). It's a 30 hour unit, but I voided the
warranty within an hour of buying it (gotta see what it looks like inside),
so as soon as is practical I'll start hacking it with larger drives etc.
Oh, I almost forgot, the biggest news in years - Mario Sunshine for
the Nintendo GameCube is out, and I got hold of it the first day. Mats and I
will be spending many late nights with this one before the 120 shine
sprites are all found.
I also got out and got Pikmin so I can have something to do during the
upcoming cold winter nights (now that sounded more pathetic than what it
actually is). Pikmin is a sweet little game - very cute, funny and extremely
inventive. Sort of like Lemmings for the new millennium.
While at it I just have to mention that the ChrutilAcademyAward (TM) for
best band right now is going to Pain of Salvation. I got hold of "The
Perfect Element I" what feels like years ago, but I never got around to
giving it a chance, and then in May this year I was in Sweden and picked up
their latest "Remedy Lane" but I never really listened to that one either (I
got back from Sweden with 15 new albums to parse through) until about a
month ago when I let "The Perfect Element I" cook in the car for a couple of
days. Well, I've gotta tell you - this album is not going anywhere out of my
sight, except to make an occasional swap for "Remedy Lane" or "One Hour by
the Concrete Lake". Holy cow, this is sweet stuff!!! Best of the best.
Gotta go, Conan is on the TiVo - Whoo-hoo as Homer would have said. |
| 7.26.2002 |
Back from Siggraph in San
Antonio, Texas. Siggraph this year was a very cool show with lots of cool
people doing very cool things. Cool. |
| 7.24.2002 |
3ds max 5
is shipping! |
| 6.3.2002 |
New section -
Funky Food! I'm trying to learn how to cook and I
can't resist telling you all about it. |
| 6.1.2002 |
Got myself a PlayStation 2. For
$200 it's a bargain I couldn't resist. Got Grand Turismo 3 and Grand Theft
Auto 3 and Jak & Daxter. A very nice complement
to my GameCube and my XBox. Why choose when you can get them all?
Hallelujah. |
| 5.29.2002 |
Ahhh.... Back in the US of A. Fog
and Jetlag. |
| 5.22.2002 |
Last week of a three week stay in
Sweden. I'm having a ball, but my side projects, like the mobile AudioServer,
has been put on the back burner until I get back to reality. |
| 5.14.2002 |
Rush has decided to please us
with a new album - Vapor Trails - their first in five years. plus, they are
coming to Shoreline Amphitheater for a show in September. Yeah!!! Be there,
or be square as they say. |
| 4.12.2002 |
Sweet! Wireless network
gear has arrived!
Amazing cool things will appear soon. Think mobile audio. Think smart, think
S-Mart. |
| 4.4.2002 |
Birthday. Now I'm officially
older than ever! |
| 3.30.2002 |
Finally! Nice weather. Cruising
time! |
| 3.22.2002 |
@#$%^ The whole effin site has been in flux for a little while. I just
finally solved the technical problem behind it. Or so I thought - some systems
are go, others are dead as a dodo, but we'll run
with it anyway.
Web sux. |
| 3.15.2002 |
Reorganized the photo album into three sections, and
added some more pictures to it while at it - check it
out!! |
| 3.1.2002 |
WWW.CHRUTIL.COM
- Yep. Chrutil has finally moved to into it's own domain. Chrutil's
domain indeed. |
| 2.8.2002 |
New Section! Have you seen me around? Do you have proof? Send me
the info to score an entry at the Chrutil
Sightings section. |
| 1.29.2002 |
Yeah!!! The new Dream Theater album is finally here. It'll take me
a week or so to figure out if I like it, but so far so good... |
| 1.20.2002 |
It's fast! It's spankin' It's... It's... It's a shiny black
Corvette! It's sweet. It's soooo sweet. |
| |
Another Cool New Toy! A Compaq
IPAQ decided it couldn't live without me. |
| 12.5.2001 |
Cool New Toy! The Pronto Pro super remote has
arrived. My life is complete. |
| |
Happy Camper! - I went to a book signing the other day and
got my limited edition Hellraiser Laserdisc boxed set signed by Mr. Clive Barker
himself. |
| 11.17.2001 |
I got it! I got it! I got it! I got it! I got it! I got it!
The Nintendo GameCube has arrived!. Got Luigi's Mansion, Star Wars
Rogue Leader and Sega Super Monkey Ball. Not quite as impressive lineup as
the xbox, but Sega Super Monkey Ball is as fun as anything can remember and
some of the levels of Rogue Leader kicks more than asses around. |
| 11.15.2001 |
I got it! I got it! I got it! I got it! I got it! I got it! The
Microsoft XBOX is here, and it rules! I got Halo, Project Gotham Racing,
Oddworld and Dead or Alive 3. Four games that turned out to kick ass on a
machine that kicks even more. |
| |
New Home Theater Pics - Check out the Home
Theater section for the new pics. I also added a section about the
equipment rack and how I put that together. |
| 7.30.2001 |
New Toy - A Nikon
Coolpix 995 digital camera and an Epson 1280 Photo printer just came in. Sweet!! |
| |
New project - the recording studio. With so much shitty music out there,
the stuff I can come up with has to be better than most. Thus, I'm setting up
a recording studio. Got an RME
Digi96/8 PST sound card for PuppetMaster (my computer dedicated to
music) and a good old Ensoniq EPS sampler as MIDI controller. Moron this
later. |
| |
3ds max R4.2 is shipping!
Download the update! (if you're a 3ds max user) |
| |
Added a page with cool or funny links. |
| |
New historical pictures on Chrutil's liv & leverne has arrived in the Photo
section. |
| |
New pictures and history of the home theater has
arrived! |
| |
Chrutil's Domain has moved to Geocities, because NBCi realized that there
is no money in portals. Well du-uh as Jay Leno would say. |
| Dec. 2000 |
The projection screen has arrived! "If this home theater was in Happy Days it would be the Fonz" |
| |
Chrutil's Top Ten of Coolness is
slowly coming online. |
| |
Chrutil is going to Outer
Space! |
| |
Disaster
Strikes the AudioServer, but it's okay cause I fixed it. |
| |
Seti@Home - I just
passed 13.000
work units - That's almost 14 years of CPU time. |
| |
The New HomeTheater Has
Arrived. |
| |
New theme! FrontPage is fun, although if there were a Golden Turkey award
for crappy websites I'd win an Oscar for mine. Well.. at least a Golden
Turkey... |
| |
AudioServer - Version 2.0. This makes your CD player/changer hopelessly
obsolete. |
